38 h 24 minAudiobook16 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if the strongest prison walls are built from debt, shame, and the need to keep up appearances?
Amy Dorrit is born inside London's Marshalsea prison. Now a seamstress, she works to support her family while her proud father, William Dorrit, remains behind its walls. Called Little Dorrit, she carries burdens far larger than her slight figure suggests. Love and duty leave her little room for herself.
Arthur Clennam returns from China with a troubled conscience and a wish to put right a family wrong. At his mother's gloomy house, he meets Amy. His efforts to help the Dorrits lead him toward buried secrets and the Circumlocution Office, where useful work meets endless obstacles. Around them, money commands respect and shame keeps people trapped.
What you’ll discover
- A quiet source of strength Meet Amy, whose daily work and care sustain her proud father and struggling family.
- Prisons beyond iron gates Explore how debt, family secrets, and the love of money can hold people captive.
- Comedy with sharp teeth Enter the Circumlocution Office, where Arthur's search for answers runs into a machinery of delay.
- A house full of shadows Follow Arthur into his mother's dark home, carrying doubts about his family's past.
- Lives woven into mystery Watch a quick-minded rent collector, an ambitious sister, and a patient inventor add their threads.
Who will love it
For readers who love large casts, sharp social comedy and family mysteries, and anyone curious about debt, class and bureaucracy in Victorian England.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- Two prisoners and a traveller in Marseilles
- A gloomy house hides what Arthur fears
- A small seamstress was born inside the Marshalsea
- The Circumlocution Office stops all useful work
- Arthur's heart wanders among old and new friends
- A rent collector hunts for a missing heir
- Sudden fortune carries the Dorrits abroad
- Every character lives in some kind of prison
- How Dickens tells a story of many threads
Who’s who
- Arthur ClennamA kind, doubtful man of forty who comes home from China troubled by his family's past and wishing to put right a wrong.
- Amy DorritCalled Little Dorrit, she was born in the Marshalsea prison and works as a seamstress to support her proud father and her family.
- William DorritThe long-term debtor known as the Father of the Marshalsea, proud of his place and sensitive about his shame.
- Mrs ClennamArthur's stern, wheelchair-bound mother, who lives in a gloomy house and holds a hard, unforgiving faith.
- Daniel DoyceA patient, practical inventor who has spent years trying to get the government to notice a useful invention.
- Mr PancksA snorting, quick-minded rent collector who works for Casby and has a talent for digging up hidden facts.
- Fanny DorritAmy's vain, sharp and ambitious sister, a dancer who wants to rise in the world.
- RigaudA smiling, dangerous prisoner who begins the book in a Marseilles cell and claims to be a gentleman.
Formats and delivery
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- Large-print eBook
- The same book in bigger, clearer type, from the first page.
- Audiobook
- 38 h 24 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 16 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
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Klein-Dorrit
by Charles Dickens · 1857
Born in a debtors' prison, Amy Dorrit supports her proud father while Arthur Clennam seeks to put right a wrong.
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In short
Little Dorrit is a novel by Charles Dickens, first published in monthly parts between 1855 and 1857. It is set in London and abroad in the years of Dickens's own youth, and it is about prisons of every kind.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
Two prisoners and a traveller in Marseilles
The novel opens not in London but in Marseilles, in a hot, bright, hateful city under a blazing sun. In a stone cell, two prisoners share a space. One is Rigaud, a handsome, smiling man accused of murder, who says he is a gentleman. The other is Cavalletto, a small Italian smuggler who is cheerful and quiet and who fears his cellmate.
The cell is the first of the book's many prisons, and Dickens uses it to set the mood. Everything here is closed in, sweating and watchful. Rigaud is charming on the surface and cruel underneath, and he will not leave the story when the prison door opens. Cavalletto, in his turn, will find that a small act of kindness can follow a person for years.
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What is Little Dorrit about?
It follows Arthur Clennam, who returns from China to a troubled family, and Amy Dorrit, born in a London debtors' prison. The novel looks at debt, bureaucracy, money and the many kinds of prison that people live in.
Why is it called Little Dorrit?
Little Dorrit is the nickname of Amy Dorrit, who is small and quiet and was born in the Marshalsea prison. She cares for her family, and her steady goodness stands at the heart of the book.
Is Little Dorrit based on a true story?
The story is invented, but the Marshalsea was a real London debtors' prison, and Dickens's father was held there when Dickens was a boy. It was published in monthly parts from 1855 to 1857.
The author
Charles Dickens
1812–1870 · English novelist
Charles Dickens was an English novelist born in Portsmouth in 1812. He lived in London and later at Gad’s Hill Place in Kent, where he died in 1870. His books include The Pickwick Papers (1836–1837), A Christmas Carol (1843), David Copperfield (1849–1850), and Great Expectations (1860–1861).
More by Charles Dickens
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